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Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Customers

One day about a week ago when I was working, a customer came up to the register as I was signing on with four two liter bottles of Diet Coke. As he was walking I said, "Oh, the four for five dollar deal, yeah?" And I think he nodded or said yes or something like that, and I rang him up and it came to five dollars. We did the cash exchange thing and as he was putting his change away I started putting them in a bag. The bags we have are surprisingly strong, so I tried to put them all in one bag at first, but clearly they weren't that strong, so I put two in each of two bags. Then he said passingly, "Can I have two bags on each, please?" So I asked, passingly, "Two bags on each?" as if to say "If that's not what you asked for, here's your chance to tell me something else," and then went to get the extra bags. Then he snapped at me and said very angrily, "Yeah, look, I know it's a revolutionary idea but I don't want these to fall on the ground, okay?"

I forget what I did, but I should have called him an asshole and refused to give him any bags.

Yesterday a woman came in and asked me to help her find a certain type of battery, so I lead her to the watch batteries she was looking for and started looking, when I was called to photo. The woman looking for the batteries was right beside the photo center, and as I was called to help the other woman, the one looking for the batteries called my attention and said, "Oh, I found them! Hmm... do you know if they have an expiration date?" So I was telling her that yes, they do expire but probably in 2012, just look around the package and I'm sure you'll find it, when the woman at photo threw her bag of film onto the desk and muttered "I'm in a rush, okay, I don't have time to wait around for you to talk to people."

I apologized to her a lot, although I wasn't sorry. Other customers have needs and the battery customer was there first. I thought about doing a lot of things to her photo order, but didn't do any of them. I probably could have gotten away with them, too, but oh well.

My old hockey coach came in the other day and got some cigarettes. You could never mistake his face for anyone, and to top it off he's missing part of his left arm. I don't think he recognized me - or if he did he didn't say anything - but on his way out he called me "pup" which is what he always called his hockey players. I don't know if it was habit or he knew.

Peace out.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

we have a lot of dick customers at Rite Aid. on a bag-related note, some weirdo construction worker comes in a lot, all sweaty and stuff, and he usually gets milk. he's always in a rush.

a few weeks ago he stomped up to the counter with a 1/2 gallon of milk. he slammed it on the counter. "would you like a bag?" i asked politely. a lot of people who get milk are just going home and don't really need a bag. unfortunately, the guy mumbled, so i didn't hear what he said. rather than do the opposite of what he wanted, i asked him (again, politely) to repeat whatever it was he said.

he FLIPPED THE FUCK OUT. "all i ask is that i come in here, get what i want, and leave without being bothered," he spat. "but every time i come in here, someone gives me some bullshit. i'm so damn sick of this place."

"i'm sorry, sir, i was just trying to be polite," i said. i gave him his change and he ran out. i made it a point not to give him a bag.

he still comes in.